Toaru Majutsu no Index
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| Toaru Majutsu no Index | |
|---|---|
 Cover of volume 1 of Toaru Majutsu no Index, published by Dengeki Bunko on April 10, 2004. |
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| とある魔術の禁書目録 | |
| Genre | Action, Fantasy |
| Light novel | |
| Author | Kazuma Kamachi |
| Illustrator | Kiyotaka Haimura |
| Publisher | Dengeki Bunko |
| Demographic | Male |
| Original run | April 10, 2004 – ongoing |
| Volumes | 21 |
| Manga | |
| Toaru Kagaku no Railgun | |
| Author | Kazuma Kamachi |
| Illustrator | Motoi Fuyukawa |
| Publisher | ASCII Media Works |
| Demographic | Shōnen |
| Magazine | Dengeki Daioh |
| Original run | March 27, 2007 – ongoing |
| Volumes | 4 |
| Manga | |
| Author | Kazuma Kamachi |
| Illustrator | Chuya Kogino |
| Publisher | Square Enix |
| Demographic | Shōnen |
| Magazine | Monthly Shōnen Gangan |
| Original run | May 12, 2007 – ongoing |
| Volumes | 6 |
| TV anime | |
| Director | Hiroshi Nishikiori |
| Studio | J.C.Staff |
| Network | MBS |
| Original run | October 4, 2008 – March 19, 2009 |
| Episodes | 24 |
| TV anime | |
| Toaru Kagaku no Railgun | |
| Studio | J.C.Staff |
| Network | Tokyo MX |
| Original run | October 3, 2009 – ongoing |
| Episodes | 24 |
Toaru Majutsu no Index (とある魔術の禁書目録（インデックス） Toaru Majutsu no Indekkusu, lit. A Certain Magical Index) is a Japanese light novel series written by Kazuma Kamachi and illustrated by Kiyotaka Haimura; the series is published by ASCII Media Works under their Dengeki Bunko imprint. The series was made into an anime[1] and aired between October 2008 and March 2009, containing twenty-four episodes. A side story manga series, Toaru Kagaku no Railgun (とある科学の超電磁砲（レールガン） Toaru Kagaku no Rērugan, lit. A Certain Scientific Railgun), began serialisation in March 2007 and was later adapted into an anime, which began airing in October 2009.[2]
Contents |
[edit] Plot and characters
Toaru Majutsu no Index is set in a city of scientifically advanced superhuman students, but in a world where magic is also real. Tōma Kamijō's right hand, the Imagine Breaker, will negate all magic, psychic, or divine powers, as well as his own luck. One day he finds a young girl hanging on his balcony railing named Index. She turns out to be a nun from the Church of England, and her mind has been implanted with the Index Librorum Prohibitorum—all the magical texts the Church has removed from circulation. His encounter with her leads him to meet others from the secret world of science and magic and an adventure with his friends where science and magic collide. Tōma's unusual power places him at the center of conflicts relating magicians and science-based espers in Academy City. As Tōma tries to help and protect his friends, he learns the people he knows are not as they appear and begins to attract the attention of magicians and espers alike as they try to unravel the secrets of Academy City and Index.
The side-story, Toaru Kagaku no Railgun, focuses on Mikoto Misaka, one of the seven Level 5 espers in Academy City, who has control over electricity. Along with her friends, she investigates a phenomenon known as the Level Upper, which boosts an esper's power, but causes them to fall into a coma soon after using it. Afterwards, she learns about the 'Sisters' experiment, in which clones of her are mass-produced for the purpose of raising the level of another esper, which ties into the third light novel.
[edit] Terminology
- Power users
- Also known as psychics or espers, they are people who can use psychic powers or supernatural powers. Most power users were born with supernatural powers while others are ordinary people who have the potential to develop them; participating in Academy City's Power Curriculum Program is one means of developing psychic powers for ordinary people with potential. Most power users are able to use their powers just by thinking. They are able to use magic, but due to their natural powers, they suffer extreme bodily harm if they do so.
- Magic users
- Magic was created by people who wanted to have powers just like their psychic counterparts. Although magic was designed so that most ordinary people can learn and use it, regardless of what type of magic it is, people with psychic powers are unable to use it without suffering injury. Likewise, magicians cannot use psychic powers without grievous harm. Once a path is chosen, one is stuck on it (there is one known magic user who gained an ability, however after doing so he was unable to use magic anymore without injury). Every sorcerer has a magical name, which is a combination of Latin and a numerical code.
- Academy City
- Located west of Tokyo, is the city where most of the series takes place. Its total population is about 2.3 million with 80% of them being students and 1/8 of those students living in the city dorms. As the city's name suggests, it is a city of several schools and institutions of higher learning from kindergarten to university level that learn side by side along with the scientists who research on psychic powers and higher technology. The city was founded by the magician Aleister Crowley to do studies and research on the development of preternatural abilities. It is a very high tech and clean city about thirty years ahead of its time. Entry to the city is forbidden to outsiders except those with psychic potential and those with given permission. Because the city's existence is protected, security is very high, with a spy satellite in space, checkpoints outside of the city, security cameras everywhere and guards constantly patrolling the city to make sure ordinary people cannot enter the city easily. The city power supply comes from the large wind turbines and solar panels that appear all over the city.
- Power Curriculum Program
- The Academy's City Power Curriculum Program is a large-scale program designed to advance a person's psychic or supernatural powers. The program is a series of tests, studies, lectures, medicines, body simulations and hypnosis used to unlock a person's powers. Most students are Level 0, normal people with no powers but may have the potential to develop powers and are encouraged to participate in the program to help them train or acquire their powers artificially. While most students will fail the program as they never had powers to begin with or fail to increase their power, some are able to advance theirs powers from Level 0 to Level 1 and possibly further. One of the program's success stories is Mikoto Misaka, as she started from Level 1 and worked her way up to Level 5; she is proof that with enough hard work and determination, anyone can become a powerful psychic.
- However, unknown to the public there is a dark side to this program. Some of the scientists who research psychic powers try to increase a person's powers, especially those with unique powers, using other unethical methods, including dangerous drugs and experiments. Some of these methods achieve their desired results while others fail with trauma or injury to the participant or, in worse cases, death. In fact, some of the most powerful psychics in Academy City are the result of these dark programs. It is implied that the board of directors of the city are aware of these experiments, but choose to turn a blind eye to them as they allow those scientists to do what they what to do as long as the public does not know and it has achieved its desired result.
- Judgment
- The public moral committee. It is made up of students with powers from every grade level whose duty is to maintain peace and order within the school system. As most of the city population are students, it is the duty of Judgment to catch those delinquents misusing their powers along with other offenders and protect the students. In the event of a situation that Judgment members cannot handle, their superiors and the city's security forces, the Anti-Skills will take over. Overall, the role of a Judgment officer is more like a part-time civilian patrol officer as their authority is normally limited to their school grounds and they can only use their authority outside when ordered to by their superiors or in cases of emergency. Most Judgment members can be recognized by the green stripped arm band with a shield symbol they wear.
- Anti-Skills
- The city's police and security forces. Unlike Judgment, most members of Anti-Skills are adults who are mostly normal people who are trained to deal with the city day-to-day activities and security, in addition to dealing with rogue psychics who abuse their powers. Most members of Anti-Skills are seen with special SWAT armor that resist psychic powers along with firearms and riot gear, which shows how serious the situation has to be for them to be called out.
- Psychic Rank
- Every psychic has a rank that determines how powerful their powers are and how much they can control. There are five levels, with level 0 being the lowest for no powers or having passive powers with no control over them. Those at level 1 have realized what their powers are and are learning how to control them, despite using a small amount of power. The users train to use their powers more under the Power Curriculum Program, and their level ranks can increase based on how much their control and use of their powers has progressed. There are no known level 6 psychics as according to the Super Computer Tree Diagram, it would take about 200 years for someone to achieve it under the Power Curriculum Program. As a result, Level 5 is the highest level. There are only seven known level 5 psychics, but only six have been disclosed so far.
- Imagine Breaker
- Toma's power is referred to as the Imagine Breaker, which is activated when his right hand comes in contact with anything supernatural. It has the ability to cancel any magic or psychic effect. It is also capable of destroying enchanted objects, such as Index's robes. It has a variable effectiveness against the results of ability use, as it is unable to stop Accelerator's thrown objects, but is able to stop the explosion caused by Graviton's powers. This power does not provide any protection to the rest of Toma's body; he must bring his hand into contact with the effect in order to cancel it, however, he is unable to be teleported. Index theorizes that his hand also neutralizes any luck it comes in contact with, which is why he suffers frequent attacks of improbable bad fortune. For fear of accidentally causing her death, Toma is careful to never touch Kazakiri Hyouka with his right hand, as her ability is to exist.
- Necessarius
- Also known as the Church of Necessary Evil, it is a secret branch of the Church of England that conducts supernatural and magical experiments to fight supernatural threats. Ironically, Necessarius was created by English Puritans who despise magic, but since Britain was a magical country during their time, they had to learn to use magic to counter magic. Their headquarters are located at St. George Cathedral in London. They are allies of the Vatican and rivals with Annihilitus, the Russian Orthodox Church (ironic, as the organization's headquarters in real life is of Orthodox Denomination). The leader of the Necessarius is surprisingly led by a young female Archbishop named Laura Stuart.
- Index-Librorum-Prohibitorum
- Index-Librorum-Prohibitorum can mean either Index, the character full name or the library of grimoires inside her brain, which are Necessarius' greatest asset. It is a collection of 103,000 of books of sorcery from all over the world. Compiled by the Church of England, the Catholic Church and other organizations, these banned books were recorded into the mind of Index, who has photographic memory, as an alternative and safe record keeper and thus making Index a living library and safer way to get information from the books since, Necessarius believes reading the originals will curse and taint that person. According to the higher ups of Necessarius, the information from the collection has caused a strain in Index mind and can only be solved by resetting her memories once a year with the price of forgetting her past.
- However it was later revealed that this is nothing but a lie as there is no damage for possessing that much information as The Church, fearing that Index will betray them or in a worse case, becomes a threat and the most powerful magician as she possesses knowledge of the world's most dangerous spells, created measures to ensure her loyalty to them. A magical rune in her throat is the real reason that has been causing her pain and forcing her to undergo a memory reset; as a last resort, the Feather of Light is activated to do an automatic reset should a manual memory reset fail to be performed on time. After the events of the first novel, these measures were destroyed by Tōma, thus enabling Index to live normally. Unfortunately, the Church is not willing to let her go so easily and for the time being are keeping a watch on her, sending their agents and their allies to "retrieve her" just in case.
- Annihilatus
- The secret branch of the Russian Orthodox Church that deals with magic. Information about this organization is limited, with the only known members being Sasha Kruezhev and Vasilisa.
- Amakusa Catholics
- A secret group of Catholic warriors in Japan. These Japanese Catholics were formed when Japan banned Christianity during the Edo period. To escape persecution, they fuse Shintoism and Buddhism with their Catholic beliefs which developed and evolved a unique form of sorcery, merging it with words and things that was used in everyday life, making it almost impossible for outsiders to read their spell pattern and spell composition. They are also skilled in melee combat and group battles. Currently led by Substitute-Supreme Pontiff Saiji Tatemiya. They are the principal allied force of Tōma.
- God's Right Seat
- A secret magical Organization within the Catholic Church, a counterpart to Necessarius. While the organization is supposed to be under the control of the Pope, in reality the organization is more loyal to the leader of God's Right Seat, Fiamma of the Right. Currently Fiamma's target is Index, for he believes she possesses the knowledge to unlock his true powers, so much so that he has sent his magicians and agents to Academy City.
- AIM (An Involuntary Movement)
- An invisible energy field that the espers involuntarily produce. One example of this is when Tōma finds Mikoto Misaka by following wind turbines that are turning without wind. Mikoto's body involuntarily produces voltage all the time; thus Tōma comes to the conclusion that it can power the wind turbines. Another is the Accelerator's "default" setting to automatically deflect any energy or matter that approaches him.
- Thanks to extensive and highly illegal human experimentation, the city scientists were able to create a reality altering entity from the combined AIM of the city's residents, Kazakiri Hyouka. She normally exists in a shadow dimension, the city of shimmers, unable to interact with people, but altering anything that attracts her attention. Contact with magic users allows her to temporarily manifest in the real world as an immortal entity; any damage she takes, even to her clothing, is repaired in a few minutes. It is unknown how or if Imagine Breaker will affect her; it is theorized that as a living entity she is immune, despite her power-based origins, or that she will be rendered a normal human, but Toma has gone out of his way to avoid touching her, for fear of killing his friend.
- Tree Diagram
- The best super-computer in the world, according to the best renowned scientists in Academy City. This computer was loaded into the satellite, Orihime 1, to monitor many aspects of the city. This computer was used for the 'Sisters' Project, to calculate a way to achieve Level 6. By taking the best level 5 (Accelerator) it was calculated that if about 128 Level 5 psychics were defeated by Accelerator, he would achieve Level 6. However, Academy City only had six other level 5 psychics, so by using 20000 Level 3 clones of Mikoto Misaka, they expected the same result. During Touma's fight with Index (while being possessed by Johann's Pen), Index accidentally shoots a Dragon Breath's attack to space and destroys the Orihime 1 satellite, destroying Tree Diagram permanently.
[edit] Media
[edit] Light novels
The light novels have been published by ASCII Media Works under their Dengeki Bunko label since April 10, 2004. As of November 2009, there are nineteen novels and two short story collections.[3]
[edit] Drama CD
A drama CD was released as a mail-in order of Dengeki hp volume 48[4] and was released later in November 2007. There are two parts of story, the first part originally aired as a radio drama in Dengeki Taishō[3] starts with an encounter with mysterious self-proclaimed "former" magician by Tōma Kamijō and Index in the family restaurant after Misaka decide to go back due to urgent business. The second part involves around Mikoto Misaka and Kuroko Shirai with their "urgent business", and a duel request by a Level 3 Psychic girl from Tokiwadai.[5]
[edit] Manga
The series has been adapted into two manga series. The one which follows the novel's storyline started serialization in Monthly Shōnen Gangan[3] in June 2007. The first bound volume was released on November 10, 2007 and there are currently six volumes of this manga. Even though the manga follows the novel's storyline, it skips the events of the second and fourth novels.
The side story entitled Toaru Kagaku no Railgun (とある科学の超電磁砲, A Certain Scientific Railgun) started serialization in Dengeki Daioh[3] in May 2007. The story tells of the events before and during the time of the novels from a different perspective from the main character, Mikoto Misaka and her friends. Currently, four volumes have been released.
- Toaru Majutsu no Index
| No. | Release date | ISBN |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | November 10, 2007 | ISBN 978-4-7575-2157-5 |
| 2 | June 10, 2008 | ISBN 978-4-7575-2299-2 |
| 3 | November 22, 2008 | ISBN 978-4-7575-2427-9 |
| 4 | March 21, 2009 | ISBN 978-4-7575-2512-2 |
| 5 | October 27, 2009 | ISBN 978-4-7575-2677-8 |
- Toaru Kagaku no Railgun
| No. | Release date | ISBN |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | November 10, 2007 | ISBN 978-4-8402-4107-6 |
| 2 | June 10, 2008 | ISBN 978-4-0486-7146-0 |
| 3 | February 27, 2009 | ISBN 978-4-0486-7719-6 |
| 4 | October 27, 2009 | ISBN 978-4-0486-8169-8 |
[edit] Anime
An anime adaptation of Toaru Majutsu no Index was produced by J.C.Staff and directed by Hiroshi Nishikiori,[1][6] and aired in Japan between October 4, 2008 and March 19, 2009. The twenty-four episodes covered the first six of the light novels. An anime adaptation of the side story manga series Toaru Kagaku no Railgun began airing in Japan on October 3, 2009.[2]
[edit] Music
Maiko Iuchi of I've Sound was in charge of the music in the anime. Four pieces of theme music are used for the episodes: two opening themes and two ending themes. The first opening theme is "PSI-Missing" by Mami Kawada, and is used for the first sixteen episodes. The second is "Masterpiece" by Mami Kawada, and is used in the subsequent episodes. The first ending theme is "Rimless: Fuchinashi no Sekai" (Rimless 〜フチナシノセカイ〜, lit. "Rimless: Rimless World")[7] by Iku, and is used for the first nineteen episodes. The second is "Chikaigoto: Sukoshi Dake Mō Ichido" (誓い言 ～スコシだけもう一度～, lit. "Oath: Just a Bit, One More Time")[8] by Iku, and is used in the subsequent episodes. A single for "PSI-missing" was released on October 29, 2008. A single for "Masterpiece" was released on February 4, 2009.[9]
The anime adaptation of Toaru Kagaku no Railgun has two pieces of theme music, one opening theme and one ending theme. The opening theme is "Only my Railgun" by fripSide, and the ending theme is "Dear My Friend: Mada Minu Mirai e" (Dear My Friend －まだ見ぬ未来へ－, lit. "Dear My Friend: Toward a Future We Haven't Seen Yet") by Elisa.
[edit] Video games
Index and Mikoto are playable characters in the video game Dengeki Gakuen RPG: Cross of Venus for the Nintendo DS.
[edit] References
- ^ a b "Toaru Majutsu no Index Light Novels Get TV Anime". Anime News Network. 2008-06-04. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2008-06-03/to-aru-majutsu-no-index-light-novels-gets-tv-anime. Retrieved 2008-06-04.
- ^ a b "Toaru Kagaku no Railgun Light Novels' Anime Green-Lit". Anime News Network. 2009-03-18. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2009-03-18/to-aru-kagaku-no-railgun-light-novels-anime-green-lit. Retrieved 2009-03-18.
- ^ a b c d "Light novels at the series' official website" (in Japanese). http://www.project-index.net/works/novel.php. Retrieved 2009-11-28.
- ^ "Drama CD available through Dengeki hp" (in Japanese). http://lightnovel.g.hatena.ne.jp/CAX/20071004/p2. Retrieved 2007-12-15.
- ^ "Drama CD information at the series' official website" (in Japanese). http://www.project-index.net/drama_cd/index.php. Retrieved 2007-12-15.
- ^ "Moonphase article on Toaru Majutsu no Index" (in Japanese). http://d.hatena.ne.jp/moonphase/20080607. Retrieved 2008-06-07.
- ^ "Music section at the anime's official website" (in Japanese). J.C.Staff. http://www.jcstaff.co.jp/sho-sai/index-shokai/index-music.htm. Retrieved 2009-02-20.
- ^ ""Chikaigoto: Sukoshi Dake Mō Ichido" single listing" (in Japanese). Amazon.co.jp. http://www.amazon.co.jp/「誓い言~スコシだけもう一度~」-TVアニメ「とある魔術の禁書目録」新EDテーマ-IKU/dp/B001NOIJGE/ref=pd_sim_m_4. Retrieved 2009-02-20.
- ^ "CD listing at the series' official website" (in Japanese). Square-Enix. http://project-index.net/item/cd.php. Retrieved 2009-02-20.
[edit] External links
- Toaru Majutsu no Index official website (Japanese)
- Toaru Kagaku no Railgun official website (Japanese)
- Toaru Majutsu no Index at ASCII Media Works (Japanese)
- Toaru Majutsu no Index at Gangan Comics (Japanese)
- Kiyotaka Haimura's website (Japanese)
- Toaru Majutsu no Index (anime) at Anime News Network's Encyclopedia
- Toaru Kagaku no Railgun (manga) at Anime News Network's Encyclopedia
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